All About GEP

[Zann]

Bronzy:

ningy:

my dd1 was selected for GEP; her 2 cousins (not sibblings) were also GEPers. so keep my fingers crossed, my dd2 is now in P1 and we are all wondering if she will follow the \"tradition\". guess she'll feel the stress when her turn comes. but my dh not too optimistic leh, this dd2 is carefree and careless with a lazy attitude.

My dd was, and still is, rather carefree and careless and has a tendency to be lazy! So you never know!

I used to hear people said that GEP is only suitable for those who are very self motivated and independent type of kids coz there are a lot of works and projects to do. Therefore when knowing my child was selected I was quite worried. He used to get negative feedback for not working hard or paying attention in class. The day when he received his yellow envelope, the first advice he got from his tr was that ,\" Must work hard ah ,...\" . But I seem to see his change after joining. Be more keen in his learning and do his work on his own quietly. Perhaps the topics of learning catch his interest now.

[Bronzy]

Neko:

your dd sounds exactly like mine ! my dd even mused that she's prob the 566th one who got into GEP.

I sometimes wonder what exactly dd is gifted in. She topped the std in her former school but that does not make her 'gifted' rite ? I read and hear about kids who are very good in Art/Music/Maths/Sports ... but my dd is not good in any of these. There isn't anythg particularly outstanding abt her.

What exactly does 'gifted' mean ? Prodigy ? high abiity learner ? hmm .. 'gifted' sounds a little elitist ...

still, I must acknowledge the GE prog is really interesting. so far dd is very happy in her new school (esp with the canteen food!) and seems to be coping. Not much hw and she has a lot of time to play and laze around.

I think I would go with High Ability Learner although I believe that is the the term used to refer to those who did well but did not qualify for GEP.

My DD also not outstanding in any particular subject. Was not top of the cohort at her previous school either - prob among the lower of the top 10%. But she does enjoy it - no longer complains about being bored as she used to in P1 - P3. Although she does sometime wistfully reminisce about how she used to be able to finish all her homework at school before. Came home one day rather excited because her new friends actually knew what she was talking about and were interested when she mentioned the bombing at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Her circle of friends at her previous school used to get bored and try to change the subject. That was the first sign that maybe she did belong after all....

By the way, my DD's favourite subjects were, and still are, .......................Recess and PE!

[CoffeeCat]

Neko:

I sometimes wonder what exactly dd is gifted in. She topped the std in her former school but that does not make her 'gifted' rite ? I read and hear about kids who are very good in Art/Music/Maths/Sports ... but my dd is not good in any of these. There isn't anythg particularly outstanding abt her.

What exactly does 'gifted' mean ? Prodigy ? high abiity learner ? hmm .. 'gifted' sounds a little elitist ...

Judging by the nature of the tests, the MOE functional definition of gifted is those demonstrating an ability to understand chim english (eng test), good reasoning with IQ questions & relationships between ideas (general reasoning) or ability to handle non routine mathematical puzzles (math test). All this might just translate to high ability learner...

[ApronMama]

[quote=\"CoffeeCat

Judging by the nature of the tests, the MOE functional definition of gifted is those demonstrating an ability to understand chim english (eng test), good reasoning with IQ questions & relationships between ideas (general reasoning) or ability to handle non routine mathematical puzzles (math test). All this might just translate to high ability learner...[/quote]

But then some top top students did not get in and some being perceived as 'lazy' students got in, leh ... Yes, there are many kind of 'giftedness' and our GEP screening is just focusing on one aspect and what our gahmen want to allocate the money in school education. For arts aspect, today, parents have to put in a lot of :moneyflies:

[KSP]

vlim:

Hi ksp,

the first gep screening test is somewhere before or after ca2, so by preparing for ca2 it somehow 'warm up' the kid brain also for the test... u can also let your kid try a few of the olypmic maths sum which u can bought it at bookstore like Popular..again to warm up your child mathematical brain..but not sure whether it works or not but at least your child has something to work on...for English I think he got to like reading story books which means most likely he will be able to understand 'tricky' or difficult passages. As for general ability test, u may like to google search abt it..u may have a rough idea how it look like but it most likely not the same as what the kid would be taking ......

Thanks for your advice.

[KSP]

Bronzy:

... I think I would go with High Ability Learner ...

I totally agreed with you. Those GEPer are High Ability Learners. Maybe one or two are really geniues.

[CoffeeCat]

KSP:

I'm thinking along the line of just give my child some help.

For the general reasoning section i recommend finding IQ questions (along the line of MENSA). Stuff like finding the next object in a sequence, looking for patterns or analogies (like word a is to word b as word c is to ___).

[CoffeeCat]

KSP:

Those GEPer are High Ability Learners. Maybe one or two are really geniues.

It is interesting to note that On the MOE website they have identified this subset of geppers called Exceptionally gifted. Those are the ones that probably become the top in their respective domains(like international academic olympiads) in the future.

[KSmom8]

syshi:

Glad that your DD school has feedback session. Not for mine though. I'm currently very concern for my DS's Math. I found out that the current GEP Math teacher actually 'skipped' a lot of items which she considered 'not important'. The teacher 'threaten' the boys not to tell their parents about it. I'm thinking of getting external tuition so that hr can cope with those 'missing' items as I find that it's not right for the teacher to just skip any items which are parts of the GEP curriculum. I worried that if I brought this up, my DS will suffer in the hand of the teacher.


The same teacher actually scolded one of the boy 'Kay Poh' just because he tried to take extra worksheet for his sick absent classmate. This was because the classmate's mom asked his help...
When this was told to the P, was told by P that maybe the way the boy asked the question was not right... I believe the P supposed to find out rather than throwing this assumption...

Anybody got suggestion?

Hmmm, perhaps I shouldn't have called it \"feedback session\"...gives the impression that more was discussed. According to DS, the HOD only confirmed with the students whether there was too much homework and discussed with them the possible reasons why they might not have time to do the homework (e.g. too many enrichment classes, etc). Don't know how he reached this conclusion but DS came home and told me that enrichment classes of non-academic nature were not important. Don't know the reason for the 'discussion' - perhaps a parent had complained. DS' classmates used to call him quite often in the evenings and at night to ask about homework... so I know that he is not alone. Anyway, homework is now mainly worksheets so it takes up less time! :lol:

DS math teacher also tends to give worksheets without much explanation. For one worksheet on estimation, the whole class had to redo because they gave the exact answers and not the estimates! Also, had to explain to DS the worksheet on HCF, LCM and prime factorisation. Not sure whether this is a teaching method. DS normally pays attention in class.

[KSmom8]

Zann:

I used to hear people said that GEP is only suitable for those who are very self motivated and independent type of kids coz there are a lot of works and projects to do. Therefore when knowing my child was selected I was quite worried. He used to get negative feedback for not working hard or paying attention in class. The day when he received his yellow envelope, the first advice he got from his tr was that ,\" Must work hard ah ,...\" . But I seem to see his change after joining. Be more keen in his learning and do his work on his own quietly. Perhaps the topics of learning catch his interest now.

Am looking forward to the day when he will be more independent. See some improvement recently ... he searches for information on the internet himself, uses the dictionary (especially chinese dictionaries) more frequently, studies for tests by himself without my prompting.